


Four Feet

by jamesiee



Series: What's with these freaking birds? (12 Days of Christmas) [1]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Check Please! 12 Days of Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Tree, Day 1: Choosing/Decorating a Christmas Tree, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-13
Updated: 2016-12-13
Packaged: 2018-09-08 07:48:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8836321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jamesiee/pseuds/jamesiee
Summary: It was supposed to be an easy trip to the store. One last grocery run before finals ended and the Haus was locked up for the break. But Holster had wandered out of the food aisles and into the seasonal part of Wal-Mart and Ransom’s first mistake had been following him with their cart. His second was not walking away once Holster skipped past the holiday candies and into the decorations.
  
  “We should get one.”
  
  “No.”
  
  “Rans, we need to.”
  
  “No.” 
   Holster insists that the Haus needs a Christmas Tree.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So the holidays aren't really celebrated where I live right now and therefore, I'm feeling the opposite of Holiday spirit so I figured maybe if I wrote about Holiday spirit, I'd be able to get in the Holiday spirit. I'm following [omgnotanothercpblog's](http://omgnotanothercpblog.tumblr.com/post/153796265936/coming-soon-check-please-12-days-of-christmas) fic/art fest list.  
> This is unbeta'd so any spelling or grammar mistakes are completely my own. My [tumblr](http://chocolatechipcookiesplease.tumblr.com%20).
> 
> Disclaimer: I am not Jewish so if anything I wrote about Holster's experience as a Jewish man at Christmas time is offensive or rubs you the wrong way, please let me know and I will take this down to fix it.

Day One: Choosing/Decorating a Christmas Tree 

It was supposed to be an easy trip to the store. One last grocery run before finals ended and the Haus was locked up for the break. But Holster had wandered out of the food aisles and into the seasonal part of Wal-Mart and Ransom’s first mistake had been following him with their cart. His second was not walking away once Holster skipped past the holiday candies and dove deep into the decorations.

“We should get one.”

“No.”

“Rans, we need to.”

“No.”

“C’mon!” Holster looked away from the displays of fake trees to Ransom. “The Haus needs a tree. It just doesn’t feel like Christmas!”

“You’re Jewish.”

“That doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy a good Christmas tree.” Holster rolled his eyes. “They’re so pretty. And bright. Ransom, pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeee.”

In hindsight, Ransom should’ve just walked away then to the safer parts of Wal-mart, but he’d never been super smart when it came to Holster. Especially when Holster tried to use his puppy dog eyes. It was more of a pained grimace that Ransom shouldn’t find so attractive. He sighed and Holster’s grin widened.

“Do you even know how to put up a tree?” he asked.

“Think of the bonding experience! We can get the frogs and tads over to help decorate as a study break.” Holster grabbed a box from underneath the raised the display and balanced it on top of the frozen pizzas and butter already in the cart. “We’re like the best captains ever. Maybe Bitty’ll make cookies and- have we grabbed ‘nog yet?”

“Grabbed what?”

“Eggnog man. Y’know the Christmas drink.” Holster grabbed the front of the cart and started to lead it back into the grocery section. Ransom held onto the handle but let himself get pulled around by his over excited boyfriend, rolling his eyes fondly.

After grabbing the eggnog and frozen fruit, cereal and milk (they were here for groceries after all), they had to double back on themselves when Holster realized that they didn’t have anything to decorate the tree with. He threw in a bunch cheap plastic ornaments, all different sizes and colours, a bag of garland, and some strings of multi-coloured lights.

Holster’s excitement dimmed slightly once they were through the checkout and realized that they now had to walk back to campus with the festive purchases. They fit most of the groceries into the backpacks they brought along for the purpose anyways. The tree wasn’t heavy but the box it came in was awkward so they ended up having to carry it between them. They got a lot of strange looks during the 20 minute walk. Ransom figured it was fair; they did look like two very strange pallbearers.

Getting the tree box into the Haus turned out to difficult, if only because there were so many shoes right in the doorway and Holster kept almost tripping on them. Eventually, he kicked them out of the way to clear a path and took all the weight of the tree box to bring it right to the living room, passing the kitchen without a glance. Ransom toed his shoes off and added them to the sprawling piles. He followed the sound of conversation and the smell of pie into the crowded kitchen.

“Whoa, team meeting?” Ransom asked.

Nursey, Wicks, Ollie, and Chowder sat in the chairs around the kitchen table, and Whiskey and Tango had brought down desk chairs from someone’s room. Dex and Bitty were over by the sink, Dex chopping something and Bitty kneading dough. Lardo sat on the counter, munching on almonds and swinging her legs.

“Holster called it,” Nursey said, motioning with his phone. Ransom took out his phone to see that the group chat had blown up while his hands were full of Christmas tree box. Holster had called a “meeting” about twelve messages ago. The twelve messages were from teammates who begged off the meeting, citing last minute papers or too much studying or just better things to do. They were cool though; Holster called team meetings at least once a day because he liked the official-ness of it. Everyone knew that if it was serious, Ransom called the meeting.

“Holzy bought a Christmas tree,” Ransom said, holding a hand out for Lardo to shake some almonds into.

“Isn’t he Jewish?” Tango asked at the same time Holster came barreling into the kitchen shouting, “DAMMIT, YOU RUINED THE SURPRISE!” and punched Ransom in the shoulder.

“You walked past with a freaking tree box, there was no surprise.” Ransom rubbed at his shoulder with a glare. “Ouch, asshole.”

“We’re leaving so soon- what’s the point of having a tree?” Dex said. Holster’s smile faded a little bit at the question.

“To decorate,” he said, hesitantly. “Team bonding?”

Bitty dug an elbow in Dex’s ribs to cut off any reply.  

“Did y’all get eggnog?” Bitty asked Holster. He brightened considerably.

“Ch’yeah man.”

“Perfect, I have whipping cream. Someone go get the rum Shitty left last time he was here. If you’re in the kitchen, you’re helping me roll out cookies, or get into the living room and set up the tree,” Bitty ordered the assembled team. Everyone moved when he started putting ingredients on the counter.

Lardo and Chowder were the first up out of their seats but they split at the kitchen doorway when Lardo went into the living room and Chowder down the stairs to find Shitty’s stash that he thought no one knew about. Holster followed closely behind Lardo. It didn’t take long for Ransom to hear the sound of ripping cardboard.

The rest of the hockey team looked at each other, eyebrows raised. With minimal disagreements, it was decided that Ransom, Ollie, Tango, and Whiskey would go help the crew with the tree while Dex, Chowder, Nursey and Wicks stayed in the kitchen to make the cookies with Bitty, who queued up a Holiday playlist on his phone and blasted it on the bluetooth speakers.

Setting up the actual tree itself was no more difficult than taking it out of the box and fluffing up the branches. Apparently, Holster had not looked at the tree box beyond checking that it was a tree before deciding that it was the one that he needed in the Haus living room. It was four feet tall.

“I can’t believe this was the tree you bought,” Lardo said, shaking her head as she placed ornaments in random places. To Ransom it looked a mess, but every time he touched something he got a smack on the hand for his efforts. He curled up on the green couch with a mug of spiked hot chocolate to ‘supervise’ while Lardo bossed everyone else around.  

“It’s so you could reach to put on the star,” Holster chirped back, grinning when a red plastic ornament hit his forehead. He had a flush to his cheeks thanks to the heavy hand with which Wicks poured rum into eggnog, his grin wide and lazy when he tossed garland back at Lardo. He sat back against Ransom’s legs on the couch, putting his hands up in surrender before a full out war could start.

“You’re a menace,” Ransom said, carding his fingers through Holster’s hair. Holster’s grin turned more sincere, a little more private. He pressed a quick kiss to Ransom’s knee before springing back up to help Whiskey untangle a line of lights.

“That’s double fines,” Lardo said. “You’re gross.”

Ransom shrugged, unconcerned. Cheery music poured from the kitchen over Bitty’s directions for the cookies and it didn’t sound like Nursey had dropped anything yet. The Haus was warm and bright and Ransom was on his way to getting drunk at 3 in the afternoon on a Monday in the middle of his senior year finals, but he didn’t care. Finals were tomorrow’s problem. Today, he was content to watch his boyfriend and his hockey team, his best friends, decorate a four foot fake tree to get into the holiday mood.


End file.
